


i can so over-complicate, people tell me to medicate

by dankobah



Series: stoner!reylo [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Bipolar Disorder, Drugs, F/M, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mental Health Issues, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recreational Drug Use, Self-Harm, Suicidal Thoughts, oh well, seriously i dont remember people asking for this, the cathartic medical marijuana au that no one asked for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 13:16:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16326977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dankobah/pseuds/dankobah
Summary: Dropping ice cubes down the tube, they stop at the pinch and stack up to cool everything down.  “You’re a snob, you know that?”  Rubbing the palm of her hand beneath his shirt, his stomach resists tensing beneath it.“It’s medicine.  Why not make it enjoyable?”  Scorched throats are no fun, neither is hacking up half a lung when the smoke creeps too far down your throat.





	i can so over-complicate, people tell me to medicate

Rey opening the window told him what she wanted more plainly than when she climbed into his lap and kept glancing to the console table behind his couch.

It’s after a movie when she does it, the credits tailing after some John Hughes movie she chose.  The eighties are nothing he knows personally, being born at the tail end of them. Of course, she knew nothing about that decade either, most of her knowledge collected from movies or stories.

All he knew about the eighties is that it would fuck with his life even today, the introduction of the Reagan Administration and the Controlled Substances Act of 1971 that subsequently fed the War on Drugs.  The stigma against any sort of drugs, including marijuana, came in turn.

For all intents and purposes it is an unfair judgment on a drug that saved his life on more than one occasion; when the tremoring became too much and psychiatric medication became too tempting to overdose on.  Bipolar and PTSD had become worse with age, twisting his head into something unrecognizable and monstrous; something scary. It left him prone to damaging himself and damaging others in the same blow.

The final straw had been _another_ hospitalization, his mother shoving a quarter of marijuana at him when he eased into the car after just leaving the facility.  Treating it like some shady drug deal was shocking.

_Your father used it for his back while you were growing up.  Maybe it’ll work for you._

After getting past the fact that his dad was a **stoner** growing up, Ben rolled a poor joint once people left him alone and lit it.  Once the smoke hit deep in his lungs, after coughing furiously and drinking almost an entire gallon of water to soothe the burn, his life was transformed.

Marijuana doesn’t cure a person, but it reduces the feeling of overactive neurons in his brain; at least, it sure feels like it.  His foray into this type of treatment was more like a free-fall, Ben is what he is, is good at over-researching _everything_.  Growing up in the nineties and attending elementary school had given him a stigma like most of the population his age: weed made you lazy, stupid, unproductive, etc.  How could it be good?

He started to feel better after smoking in the morning, sitting on his balcony with the New York Times in one hand and a joint in the other.  Lazy mornings like that fueled him and everything began to smooth out. THC mingled with his antipsychotic in a way that things become easier.  Talking feelings through became less frustrating, group therapy actually became useful.

Ben started to interact with people again, using an excuse of _let’s smoke a bowl and play XBOX for 8 hours_.  Poe, his downstairs neighbor and childhood friend, is more than happy to oblige.  Social interaction healed him more. He’ll never be on the scale that most normal humans are at with the want of social moments, but it's better than induced agoraphobia.

While Poe drove him up the wall (how can Ben hear him _downstairs_?), Rey sauntered into his life because of him.  It was Ben’s 30th birthday, Poe throwing him a **small** party to “ring it in suitably”, Finn came and brought the bottled sunlight with him.

They had never spoken before, their first time being over rolling mango Swisher.

_“That looks too tight.”_

_Glancing_ _up at her, it’s the girl who he’s just stopped tracking around the party. Tan skin and honeyed green eyes, teeth rake her plush bottom lip between her teeth._

_Not even bothering to look at the blunt as he holds it up to his mouth to lick the wrap, he ponders if she knows who exactly he is.  “Is it?”_

_Nodding furiously, “Of course, I could be wrong.  I’m Rey.” Holding out her hand, he glances to the blunt before setting it on the table, shaking it._

_“I’m Ben.  Wanna smoke it to see?”_

It wasn’t apparent at the time, but Rey would worm into his life until she became harmonious with it.  Their early days were modest, in his apartment kissing more than actually watching the movie playing on the TV.  

Lust came before love but the latter barrelled after the former with a cloaked demeanor.  Plenty happened on the couch they now sat, the first time he left her with trembling thighs and a hoarse voice one of the better memories.  Sometimes if he squinted, he could still see the stain he tried so hard to scrub out for posterity.

They are hooked to each other, claws in each other’s backs and never letting go.  If Ben believed in marriage, she would be it; the be all end all that would change that entire belief.

“Can we…” Bringing him back to the now, Rey is leaning in the doorway to the kitchen.  The microwave glows nine thirty behind her head, his T-shirt hanging off her shoulders.  She looks delectably good in black panties beneath the cotton he would be pulling off her later.

Though Rey always looked too beautiful for this undeserving universe.

Without hesitation, his body rises from the couch with a small pop in his shoulders as he flexes the lethargy out.  It is about time to smoke again anyway; the bong is already set out on the dining room table where it typically resided during the day.  With an easy grip on the neck, he takes it; it’s still slightly cool from the ice melt in the pinch. It fucked up the water level, but regardless of that, Ben impulsively got fresh purified water every time he used it.

Stepping past Rey to open the fridge, he pours out of the Brita, his easy filling isn’t disrupted by her arms wrapping around his waist. Her face is nuzzling just between his shoulder blades, he’s gotten used to being touched by someone, modest hand holding morphing into the constant tuck into him when they had a private moment.  Touch came naturally now, as easy as breathing. In a life full of gasping, it gives the air of safety that is scarce when trauma colored every nook and cranny of a brain and body. The feeling of serenity is normally lost. The inability to actually distinguish past from present, danger from normalcy is hidden in the shuffles of someone affected.  

Dropping ice cubes down the tube, they stop at the pinch and stack up to cool everything down.  “You’re a snob, you know that?” Rubbing the palm of her hand beneath his shirt, his stomach resists tensing beneath it.

“It’s medicine.  Why not make it enjoyable?”  Scorched throats are no fun, neither is hacking up half a lung when the smoke creeps too far down your throat.  

Shrugging, her finger hooks in his belt loop.  “So annoying.”

Humoring her, “What’s so annoying?”

Unwrapping from him as he turns around, he leans against the counter.  Holding the bong between them, the scientific glass is at little risk.  Crying over broken bongs isn't on his agenda tonight, the biting of her lip yelling otherwise.

“Pants.  You wearing them specifically.”  Snorting, he leans off the counter.  Smiling up at him, she’s now the one leaning forward.  Moving the glass to the side, her hands come to trace along his ribs as she lifts onto her tiptoes.

Her lips press against his, sweet and edging on steamy as her tongue swipes his bottom lip.  The puppy dog eyes almost break his heart as he pulls away. “Buy me dinner first, why don’t you.”  An attempt at humor, it kinda works as her nose crinkles.

“I suppose it’s fair since you buy me dinner all the time.  But I don’t like it.” Cross voice on, it's so adorable that he wants to coo.

Instead, he hums, free hand coming to rest along the curve of her hip.  “Let’s get high, then I can see what I can do **for your troubles**.”

He’s only a gentleman after all, and her appreciative smile feeds him.  Pressing a kiss to her forehead, they break apart. “I can load a bowl while you change into sweats?”  Assuming correctly that he wants to get out of his jeans (they’re getting tighter by the minute), he only nods.

“Good plan.  You better be done by the time I get back.”  Playful threats only fueled her fire, evident by a tiny smirk.  Setting the glass on the counter behind him, he steps past her and down the hall to his bedroom.  

It’s smaller than he typically liked, but he’s glad he can at least have the luxury of a king bed in here.  The length of his body doesn't like anything smaller, meanwhile, the mattress swallowed Rey. Despite the cramped quarters, he opens his dresser drawer and rifles through sweatpants.  Varying shades of black and charcoal stare back at him, his hands grasping a heathered pair.

Belt coming off, he sets it aside.   _For later_.  Pushing the jeans off his hips, it’s a quick toss in the laundry basket along with his boxers.  Merely glancing at the underwear drawer, he decides against it. His cock is half-hard, uninterested in confinement.

After shucking the sweats on, he takes a very human moment to put on more deodorant and to examine himself in the half mirror.  Shedding the t-shirt, he’ll risk ash burns for Rey to admire the physique he worked so hard for. It seemed to be her favorite thing to gaze at or comment on and he’s always been a people pleaser.

Shutting his door behind him, he walks back out to the living room.  Rey’s tucked up onto the couch, bong set on the coffee table in front of her and grinder neatly closed beside it.  Blanket sitting across her shoulders, he kisses the crown of her head before sitting beside her. Muscle memory has him grabbing the bong, Rey squirming her way to tuck into his side.

Needy Rey is a treat he rarely gets and he wonders what is on her mind.  Bowl unlit, she’s unsurprisingly waited for him to start it. Picking up the lighter off the coffee table, he flips it upside down to resist the burn of his skin.  The flame kisses the green and ignites, Ben, breaths in and drawing smoke into the empty space. Pulling the bowl from the downstem, a practiced and fast inhale clears it.  Shooting to the back of his throat to sit, it’s only a moment before it slowly drifts out of his mouth, until he exhales the rest through his nose.

His tolerance like a tank, it's not even close to getting him high.  Pure Indicas made his body feel like it's melting like ice cream on a blazing summer day, serving sleep and wound up anxiety well.  “Nice.” Rumbling it into his shoulder, Rey sits back up to take the glass from him. Only happy to oblige, a few good hits on this piece typically does her in.

Positioning her lips carefully, the bowl is still going as she drags smoke through.  Inhaling after the absence of the bowl, he can see her little struggle on the exhale.  Though she completes it like a champ, a little cough punctuating the end.

Warm and against him, he’s higher on her than the hits he takes.  Haze hangs in the air. “Hit for your thoughts?” Holding out the bong to her, she takes it tenderly with a nod of her head.  

After a long exhale, smoke blowing a thin column, she sets the piece back on the coffee table.  An even lengthier pause before, “My psychiatrist wants to put me on an antidepressant.”

Head slightly hung as she says it, he wishes she wouldn’t so he could look her in the eyes.  Instead, he opts for her cheek, eyes grazing over the curve of her jaw. “How do you feel about that?”

Before giving his opinion or support it's better to know her initial perceptions.  Resentment could brew like hurricanes if he's wrong, her perceptions sometimes so unexpected that he wouldn’t dream of understanding immediately.  Mustering up the courage, she looks up at him. “I feel like... there are other options. Like this,” Gesturing to the bong on the table, his eyes don’t even drift from hers.  

When you have the luxury of the choice, it also brings on the pros and cons of it.  Or the acknowledgment of them, combating the anxious hands that his hands push through her hair.  Instead, he sits up more to resist the natural melt into the couch.

“There are other options like medical marijuana, you’re not wrong.  How much do you typically use outside of this?” Carding through his own hair, is Rey really at the point of a recommendation regarding antidepressants?  Or is it the pharmaceutical culture they operated in, that he still had a foot in? Four hundred milligrams of Lamictal is no cakewalk, neither is the dosage increase he got when things are a little too depressive.

There's a necessity for medications, life-saving requirements, but the over-prescription is a dangerous issue.  Maintaining confidence in her mental health team, worries are being crushed like a trunk lid struggling to close.

“I don’t really... **use** outside of you.  I know this helps though, I go to sleep much calmer and I don’t get scared when you touch me.  I feel evener.”

Rey doesn't get high outside of this?  Shocking, he rubs his thumb along the curve of her shoulder.  The realizations she’s making drip-feeds his heart, touching her one of his favorite past times.  

Taking a moment to process his intention before, “Well that’s good that you feel good in these current conditions.  I can understand and empathize with your situation, Rey.” Sensitivity always took cautious precedence when talking through her emotions, given to him tenfold by her.  It’s only a sound idea to reciprocate to someone who makes his life so much easier.

Finally, she looks at him, sage tinged eyes analyzing.  “What does it actually **mean** to use medically?”

Medical use varied from person to person.  Different tolerances, consumption methods, and what type of ailment you are trying to lessen the side effects of.  Different moods required different strains for most, sativa-hybrids boosting the quality of his freelance journalism or the paintings he composes in his free time.  Synapses fire in just the right way then, his brain on creative rocket fuel. Indicas brought a heaviness even better than a weighted blanket (Ben would know, he bought anything to “cure” his anxiety).  The sensation made his eyes _ache_ to close, crave the slip off into unconsciousness.  Unable to really condense all of this down, he opts for simple.

“You use when you need it.  There are a lot of different methods, I’ve tried all of them and you can ask about any of them. However,”

Looking for a good way to put what he’s about to say, she’s looking up at him with big round eyes.   _She’s new to this_ _side._ “Everyone’s physiology is different.  What might work for me, might not work for you.”

Unwinding from her, he’s on one of his famous long-winded teaching moments.  Rey never seems to expressly mind them, even if she seldom listens.  Ben doesn't mind that. Walking to the console against the wall, Rey turns to look behind the couch at him.  Feeling her eyes bore into him, he leans down and opens up a drawer.

A meticulously organized stash looks back at him.  Strain types grouped together, they’re even sorted into separate strains beyond that.  “It’s all about experimentation.” Hands rifling through eighths, they find purchase on two strains he particularly likes.  Keeping them on backstock, this is an even better use.

“Jawa and Northern Lights are two strains I like.”  Setting them in front of her, she’s looking up at him again.  Then she looks at both of the containers before reaching to grab one, curiosity coloring her actions.

Opening them, he goes on, “Northern Lights is an Indica, sometimes Indica-Hybrid.  It makes me brain flatline but in a nice way.” To clarify for her, he doesn’t want her to think no thoughts are scary.  In contrary, an empty brain felt better than he ever expected. Her nose is inside the container, smelling the piney and robust aroma that he can detect from here.

”Smells real…good.” Slightly surprised, she sets it down and opens the other to smell.

”Ah, that's Jawa.  Heavy Indica, super resiny.  Touch it.” Viewing tentative fingers pick the bud out of the container, childlike wonder warms the cockles of his typically icy heart.

”Feels kinda sticky.”  Nodding as he sits back next to her, his hand settles on her thigh.  An easy hold on her, she drops the last bud back in and twists on the lids.  

Hesitating before, ”I can't possibly take these.”  Ben had enough weed to survive twice over. What's two-eighths besides something to be barely craved?

Shaking his head, ”They're yours.  Consider it a _nice weather_ present _.”_ Rey seemed to find the excuse of gifts more palatable than just unadulterated kindness.  Ben ran with it.

Grasping the bong again, lips poise for a hit and he lights the bowl.  Drawing in, ”So what should I smoke it out of?”

Smoke floats out of his mouth as he thinks of the response.  ”What do you want to smoke it out of?” There is absolutely glass he could part with, handing off the bong to her.  She takes it like a newborn baby, and he rises again.

Rey rises also to hover, as she usually does when Ben is on a mission.  Kneeling down to rifle through the cabinet of the console, glass clinks as his hand finds purchase on exactly what he's looking for.  Ben considers himself a sort of collector, glass pieces coming into his life so seamlessly that he doesn't know what happened when he's amassed ten pieces plus.  It'ss the constant pursuit for something better or something even further utilitarian. He prefers scientific looking pieces over anything pretty, he assumes she’ll be the opposite.

Pulling a small, starter bong for him, he looks it over.  A curved neck that functioned as a splash guard and multiple diffusion points, it's something he could let go of so easy now that he had better things.

“No, I can’t take that from you.”  Holding up her hands as he stands upright, he shakes his head.

“I want you to.  Please?” Holding it out to her, he’s putting on his best puppy dog eyes.

Tentatively grabbing it from him, she sets it on the coffee table without so much of a glance.  “What do I say to my psychiatrist?”

Another very good question, an issue that gave Ben pause for the longest time.  “You don’t receive the recommendation from her, there are separate doctors who assess and give you the approval you need for the state application.  It’s easy here since Colorado is one of the first states that legalized.”

Wandering past her, he’s taking another hit to let her process.

As smoke flows from his mouth, “But you should still keep her updated and aware for the sake of your care plan.  Maybe you won’t need medication, but it could be an option or a possibility at some point. It’s better to be completely transparent.”  Her brow furrowing, he hopes he hasn’t disappointed her or discouraged her.

Silence sits between them, and his nervous energy has him picking up the living room to preoccupy.  

“Will you help me set up an appointment?”  Getting him to look up from where he's leaning for a tossed throw pillow, she shuffles over to his side of the room.  Grabbing the pillow off the hardwood, he tosses it on the couch as he nods.

The smile that stretches across her face makes his own lips curve upwards.  “Anything I can do for you, I’ll do.” Stepping even closer to him, she lifts up onto her tiptoes to kiss him.

Delicate transitioning to needy, he can’t help the course of his hands to crawl beneath the back of the oversized t-shirt.  They find purchase just over her panties, giving a testing squeeze. Lips part for breath, an exhale of a giggle passing between both of them.

Coming down from her tiptoes, her hands are holding across his ribs, thumbs smoothing into the bare skin.  They’re then smoothing over his sides, over scars long healed. There had been a time where a blade became much more bearable than actually feeling something and his skin is riddled with evidence.

Ben thinks it's a weakness, she had whispered otherwise in the dark of the night once.

Rey doesn't seem to mind the scars, having a few of her own that she doesn't like to talk about.  In exchange, she could care less about the scar that cut a line from the corner of his brow to the right side of his cheek.  A serious car accident at twenty-three, an idiotic attempt at feeling _something_ that time.

His life had been a series of feelings and then suppressing them when they became too crushing.  Ben could bottle like the best of them but Rey is patient. She gently prods whereas others snap.

“Are you high?”  Asking to derail his thoughts, he wants _his_ girl satisfied before he can begin the real work.  

Blushing, her hand drifts down each muscle of his abdomen.  “I could get more high but we can also expedite other processes while I do.”  Formal sounding, her face is anything but as she steps impossibly close to him.

With a life previously viewed through a smoke screen, things had become crystal clear.

Ben wanted to spend the rest of his existence with Rey, and nothing could stop that.

**Author's Note:**

> hello hello. it's been a while since i've written one of these. this work means a lot to me and is very close to my heart. i wrote it more for a cathartic way to deal with some feelings and decided to publish it in the process, despite what people might think of it or the alternative works that others would want me to post.
> 
> im coming up on a year of legal medical use in November, and i don't see a ton of fic about this subject being written in an intelligent or compassionate way. i heavily research every subject i write so it's nice to have known something without having to look a ton up. that being clear, i can tell you that marijuana isn't addictive (physiologically, you can become psychologically addicted to shampoo). you cannot overdose. there are a multitude of studies done on how it affects conditions/disorders, i highly encourage looking them up and reading through. like any amount of research, there is good and bad. there is also a lack of it, considering a longtime difficulty of conducting research on cannabis in the states.
> 
> medical cannabis has helped me in more ways than imaginable once i locked down my care regimen. it has been a contributor to keeping me alive and somewhat sane during this awful period of depression im experiencing currently. it helps me eat and sleep, it helps my anxiety not flare around people. it helps with my chronic pain, it has basically saved my life for all intents and purposes. 
> 
> all of that being said, thank you for reading this. if you feel angered or incensed and want to leave a comment, please take a moment to reconsider it. that being said, if you do leave an inflammatory comment, i am not going to reward you with a response/argument. im not your mother.
> 
> a big thank you to [Lissa](https://forceghostlissa.tumblr.com/) for the beta. i also want to thank [Mina](https://mrsviolentfrights.tumblr.com/) and [Mads](http://qalupalik.tumblr.com/%22) for their support and love in this really hard period of my year (and occasional roasts when i need them). you can find me @ [dankobah](https://dankobah.tumblr.com/).
> 
> chapter title taken from "breathin" by ariana grande
> 
> piece gallery (quite possibly my fave part of this)  
> [ben's piece](https://dankgeek.com/collections/diamond-glass/products/diamond-glass-juggernaut?variant=44324684806)  
> [rey's new piece](https://www.smokecartel.com/products/upc-honeycomb-perc-water-pipe-with-splash-guard)


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